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NUTRITION

Good Nutrition -- Cornerstone of Good Health

Our goal as pet owners should be to maintain good health by providing proper nutrition. How does the diet you provide stack up? Check the vegetable and fruit charts on this site for calcium and ascorbic acid content. For a quick overview of dietary recommendations, read the Diet page.

There is no greater service you can do your guinea pigs than to provide them a proper diet.

Providing proper nutrition is essential to good health. Vicki of JPGPR notes that diet affects, "coat, skin, growth, energy, appetite, teeth, reproduction, organ effectiveness, immunity and ability to fight off disease/infection". Fresh water, quality pellets and hay make up the backbone of a good diet. A variety of fresh vegetables supplement their requirements for vitamin C and other micro nutrients.

Nutrition is a vast and complex subject. We all have our own thoughts on what to feed our pets; ideas shaped by preconceptions, tradition, cultural beliefs, and our own views on human nutrition. Cost, availability and convenience also come into play. A few people will strive to provide an all natural diet, but the majority of us will include a pelleted feed specifically designed for guinea pigs, along with grass hay and fresh vegetables.

The author's personal bias is to offer a high quality pelleted feed, abundant hay, familiar vegetables (and some fruits), and fresh forages.

While the Diet page is an excellent and thorough overview of a basic guinea pig diet (fresh water, unlimited grass hay, a cup or so of vegetables per day per pig, and high quality plain pellets), you may want more detailed information. Read also:

Remember, guinea pigs are herbivores!

Avoid these foods:

Don't fall for commercial treats marketed for guinea pigs (like yoghurt drops) which can even be detrimental to their health. Consuming these empty calories (many contain fat, sugars and even excess calcium) can result in decreased consumption of the basic foods they really need.

Do not feed mixes or treats with nuts, seeds, dried fruit and dyed pieces.

Do not use mineral wheels.

Do not feed meat.

Do not feed rabbit pellets (they do not contain Vitamin C and some may even include antibiotics toxic to guinea pigs).

Do not feed dairy products.

On Dairy Products

Harkness and Wagner in The Biology and Medicine of Rabbits and Rodents describe guinea pigs as strict herbivores. They have this to say about milk:

The 1992 edition of Richardson's Diseases of Domestic Guinea Pigs compares cows milk with guinea pig milk, and in cases of loss of the mother, recommends getting the young off a replacer as soon as possible. Another reason not to use cows milk:

".....encourage the orphans to eat solid foods as early as possible as a high percentage of orphans which receive too much milk replacer develop cataracts and become blind. The development of cataracts is thought to be associated with the intake of too many complex sugars which are dissimilar to those found in natural guinea pig milk."

Elizabeth Hillyer, DMV in her chapter on guinea pigs describes them as being "completely herbivorous" (with the exception of placentophagy). No specific mention of what not to feed, only of what is appropriate. Milk is not listed.